


hallowed be thy name

by badmeetsevil



Category: 1917 (Movie 2019)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Infant Death, M/M, Religious Conflict, Religious Imagery & Symbolism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-02
Updated: 2020-02-02
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:50:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22535017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/badmeetsevil/pseuds/badmeetsevil
Summary: When they get to Ecoust, Laurie is dead. The baby is not.(companion piece to goldpaint's "our father who art in heaven.")
Relationships: Tom Blake/William Schofield
Comments: 8
Kudos: 103





	hallowed be thy name

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ammunitionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ammunitionist/gifts).



> micah and i really popped the fuck off with these ones boys!!
> 
> our fics are the same scenario, centered around each of the boys. mine is blake-centric, his is schofield-centric. please read both to truly understand the scenario! 
> 
> this is also for the 2nd devon discord server!! thank you for putting up with us (-:

All Blake can focus on is the sound of his own breathing. 

If he takes his attention away from his own breathing, he will slow down. He will realize just how hard his lungs are working to get air into his body, and he will realize just how tired he is of running. 

He doesn’t notice when the German falls until what seems like minutes after it happens. He doesn’t notice when Schofield starts to disappear into some sort of opening until a hand is grabbing frantically at his ankle, pulling him down with him. Schofield is already halfway into the basement when Blake realizes that he needs to join him. 

Blake grabs his rifle tight with both hands as Schofield surveys the room, he’s a lot more observant than Blake is, and Blake will admit that. There’s a shred of light peeking out through a doorway, and he lets out an almost relieved sigh: hope.

Blake doesn’t even register his own thought, how childish it seems, before Schofield’s arm is hitting him in the chest, holding him back. Blake looks at him, and Schofield makes a point about how it could be the Boche. “Look at the ground,” he tells him, quiet, as to not alert anyone of their presence. 

Schofield barely points to it with the barrel end of his rifle, and Blake looks directly below them. Dark and dried on the concrete, Blake sucks in one of his cheeks between his teeth as he registers that it’s most likely blood. 

Schofield raises his rifle, and Blake follows in suite. The older of the two leads them into the room, and not even he, with the strength that he portrays in almost every waking moment he’s with anyone, can hold back a grimace the the scene placed before them. The young man whimpers out a gentle, “Oh, God,” distracting him from the rest of the room. Blake raises a hand to his mouth to hide his shock. From who, he’s not sure. 

He feels like he’s seen everything, and sometimes he still manages to get choked up. 

He looks out at the woman lying on the floor near the fire, her face, from what he can see (which is almost nothing), is white, sickly white. She has one hand grasping her upper left arm, and dried blood coats her fingers and the palm of her hand, even down her arm a bit. The blood trail leads to her, and settles underneath her body.

Blake’s stomach turns. Schofield approaches her body and begins to inspect.

He needs to distract himself from the scene before them, and also needs to avoid being sick, so he inspects the room rather than witness Schofield’s inspection of the woman. There’s a noise somewhere in the room, and Blake almost writes it off as some sort of animal that’s survived and made its way into the room.

But, he can’t. 

The sound gets louder, crisper, and yet still muffled, as he approaches an old, mahogany dresser. It’s coming from below it, so he crouches, opens the second to bottom drawer, and there’s nothing. He’s almost ready to think of it as just his imagination, but he opens the very bottom drawer, and is given a complete eyeful. 

He almost cries just at the sight. 

A baby looks up at him, wide eyed and bright, coughing. He lowers his rifle, and allows it to lean on the wall. “Hello, shh…” he coos to the small child, picking them up and holding them gently in his arms. He smiles slightly at the baby, swaddled in a faded, pink blanket. 

Schofield’s voice breaks him out of this moment, bringing him straight back to reality. “She’s dead. Been so a few days, I think.” Blake can hear his voice but cannot take his eyes away from the child in his arms. 

“What have you got over there?” His voice rings out, and Blake can barely vocalize it.

“It’s a baby, Will.” 

Schofield’s over Blake’s shoulder in seconds. They are both looking at this child, this baby who has had everything torn from her, and somehow, she’s still here. She smiles as soon as Schofield is in her line of sight. 

It makes Tom laugh. “I think she likes you,” he tells Will, completely serious. There’s a smile on Tom’s face that is unlike any smile Will has ever seen on him. Tom cradles her, her body, small now protected, under him, under both of them. 

The baby begins to cry, and Will immediately takes her from Blake’s grasp, like this is something he was born to do. He shushes her and rocks her gently, and all Tom can do is watch. He’s enamored by the fact that there’s a _fucking baby_ there. He can’t remember the last time he saw a baby, saw something so innocent, so unaware of the war. Will’s rifle begins to drop from his shoulder, and Tom removes it from his arm completely, leaning it against the dresser near his own. 

“I’ve got milk in my canteen, remember,” Will speaks up, and Tom remembers. He goes behind Will and fiddles with a shaking hand to get the metal container out of it’s side pocket. He listens to Will coo at the baby and talk gently to her. It makes Tom beam, almost to an unbelievable amount. Tom retrieves the metal container from his pack, handing it to him quickly. 

They use the wobbly old oak table to hold the canteen, and Will opens it as quickly as he can with one hand. Tom holds the base and tips it a little so that the milk inside rushes towards the opening at the top, allowing Will’s finger to become coated in the white drink. 

Will holds his hand towards the girl’s mouth, and she opens, sucking gently on his finger, trying to take as much as she can. Tom lets out a laugh, he’s honestly surprised that worked. “Would you look at that,” Tom says, breathily through a laugh. It all feels very homelike, for the first time in the longest time. Will looks at Tom and he smiles, a toothy smile and his eyes brighten in the light of the fireplace. 

Tom cannot stop looking at Will. He looks so much like he belongs in this scenario, like he was meant to be a father, or an uncle. He remembers Will talking about his sister’s daughters, and he wonders how familiar he is with feeding and taking care of children. He looks so natural, and Tom’s completely infatuated by it. 

Will catches him. “What’re you lookin’ at me for?” He asks, a twinkle in his eye and a grin that he can’t wipe off his face. 

“Can’t help it,” Tom replies, half joking, half deadly serious. His smile is infectious, and when Will takes his finger from the baby’s mouth, she makes a happy gurgling sound. Tom practically giggles with glee at it, and Schofield gives a hearty laugh in response. 

“She really likes you, Will,” Tom tells him, and Will can only nod in response. 

The baby keeps coughing and coughing, spittle escaping her mouth as Schofield tries to gently place his finger, now with more milk on it, back into her mouth. She coughs until her little face is red.

Blake just wipes her face with the sleeve of his jacket when she coughs so hard that she triggers more tears to stream from her eyes. 

Schofield adjusts the baby so that Blake takes part of her weight in his younger grasp, supporting her head, her neck. Blake tries to ignore the cough, her inability to catch her breath, but he can’t ignore it when Schofield brings it up. 

“Tom,” Schofield’s voice breaks into Blake’s ears, and he takes her weight back into both of his arms, cradling her. He presses his lips to the baby’s forehead, his eyelashes fluttering quickly like he’s tries to blink away tears. Blake can only watch. 

She’s been alone, with no attendance or help or fucking _food_ for days.

“Tom, I think she’s got a fever.”

Blake’s Adam’s apple bobs as he tries to swallow back a dreadful noise. 

“A bad one.” 

Blake presses the back of his hand to the forehead of the baby, and it shocks him just how warm she is. He thinks maybe it’s the blanket, or the fire, but then it suddenly dawns on him just how cold it is in the room, and his eyes widen, shiny with tears. 

“What are you implying?” Blake asks him, and God, his voice is already wrecked from holding back emotion. 

Schofield shakes his head, and opens his mouth to try to speak but he can’t get proper words out. Blake looks at the girl in his arms, this innocent girl, God, barely a girl, _a baby_ , a baby who has done nothing wrong and gets repaid by God with this, with war. 

Schofield gently places the girl back into her makeshift bassinet in the dresser, and she is practically screaming at this point. Blake has his hand over his own mouth to stifle his own cries that are threatening to escape him at this point. 

“We can’t... “ Schofield starts, and a shudder of a breath escapes out of Blake’s mouth and through his fingers. “We can’t bring her. Even if we could, the fever…”

Blake knows that Schofield makes sense, and that he means best, but standing here, right here, next to this baby, the baby whose life now literally rests in their hands, it’s a lot harder to see his fucking point. 

The younger male can’t control it as a tear rolls down his face, “We can’t… leave her here... “

“Can you think of anything better to do?” Schofield practically whispers. To be completely frank, Blake can maybe think of about one thousand other things to do, things to do other than what Schofield is implying. 

Except, they’re one thousand things that won’t work. 

Blake rambles off anyway. “We- We could take her to the aid post, I-I know there’s one near by, you told me!” He’s speaking in just above a whisper, but it’s like he’s shouting at God. His voice shakes, “There’s got to be something, anything but that.”

“We don’t have time, Tom,” Will stutters out a few more words but Tom has come to accept the fact of what has to be done.

But, they cannot leave her. They have to do something else. Something that Tom has been dreading. _God, he’s gonna throw up_. His hands shake at the idea. 

They cannot just leave her alone like this. They both understand that leaving her to suffer alone and afraid is even worse than what they could do to end this. _They could end this_. 

“She’ll be _alone_ ,” Schofield emphasizes to Blake, and all Blake can do is nod. His hand is over his mouth in a mix of pure shock and bereavement. They have to. 

They have no time to give her, but they give her as much as they can. Blake and Schofield exchange no words as Schofield prepares her final send off. 

Schofield is crying now, and he gives her a soft send off with a Lear poem, gentle as can be.

Blake knows it’s the only way to go about this, and yet he still can’t look when Schofield does it. He looks down at the concrete floor, and he prays. 

He prays for God to keep her soul safe when she enters Heaven. He prays that she will be granted into Heaven with open arms from the Father and the Son, and that she will soon see her mother again. She didn’t do anything to deserve this, her mother didn’t do anything to deserve this. She is just a baby, after all. 

He prays, oh God, he prays that the Lord will forgive them. He prays that the Lord will understand.

There’s no noise. She doesn’t cry, she doesn’t scream, she doesn’t move, she just succumbs to the lack of oxygen and her illness. 

And she’s gone. Just like that.

The little girl who brought them so much joy, such a sliver of happiness in the middle of a warzone, was gone. 

Blake watches as time seems to slow down, Schofield returning the girl to her drawer, her final resting place. He listens to Will’s shallow, stuttering breaths, and approaches him slowly. He wants nothing more than to give him comfort in these moments, but he wants nothing less than to frighten him or put himself on him. 

When Schofield stumbles backwards, Blake is there to steady him.

He puts a hand on his back, calming and gentle, and gently rubs circles in it. Schofield’s entire body practically shakes, and it’s only moments before he can barely stand on his own. His entire body is exhausted from holding in and holding back. 

He collapses against Blake, and Blake holds him up. He holds him close, cradles him, wraps one arm around his back and his other hand goes up to hold his head. Schofield buries his face into Blake’s neck, wrapping both arms around him, tight, and shows no signs of letting go.

Blake will be there as long as he needs him. 

Schofield’s fingers grasp at shoulders and at his neck, any kind of holding he can grab onto. His tears stain the collar of Blake’s shirt and get onto the side of Blake’s neck, and Blake only holds him closer, tighter, if that’s even possible for him.

They mourn together. Mourn for time lost and time that couldn’t be given, mourn for life found and lost. 

Schofield's body shakes in Blake's arms, and Blake uses every ounce of strength, mental and physical, to keep the older man standing.It doesn't work, and Schofield begins to collapse underneath the weight of his own body and his own mind. 

Schofield falls to his knees, hands scrambling to grab at any part of Blake's body for leeway. He weakly grabs at Blake's legs, and settles for wrapping his arms around Blake's knees. He sobs, wailing like a wounded animal caught in a trap. Blake squeezes and rubs at Schofield's shoulders trying to coax him into standing back up. 

Blake has never heard him grieve like this.

Blake has seen him watch dozens of men die at the drop of a hat. Schofield has killed men before without batting an eye, at least without letting anyone see him think anything else of it. But this, this was all different. This was very different. 

Somehow, it being a little girl made all the difference. It made it real.

Blake takes one of Schofield's upper arms in his grasp, and whispers, "Come on, Scho." He grips him tightly and gives him a light tug, "We've got to go, we're running out of time." Blake is finally able to get Schofield to his feet, and he wraps his arms around his body in a further attempt to comfort him. The hug is long lasting, and Schofield will not pull away. 

Blake knows it’s what he needs.

Footsteps have become more apparent outside, approaching and leaving, leaving behind a path in the dirt. Somehow, this seems to stir Schofield to his core, and he wipes his crying face one last time and he picks up his rifle. “We have to go,” Schofield mutters, finding strength back in his voice, “Your brother needs us.”

He’s right. This mission has to be completed, they have to make it to Ecoust, they have to deliver the message. Blake just can’t believe how Schofield is able to internalize his mourning so quickly. One second he is on his knees, the next he is ready to fly back into a battlefield. It astounds him. 

Blake retrieves his rifle, and nods towards him. 

Schofield takes stand by the closed door, and Blake stands closer to the thin walls. They take into account the footsteps. Two, four, six, there’s no way of telling how many there are, but it’s not like there are dozens of them, thank God. They stand there, and they wait, and wait, and wait, until the footsteps are out of earshot. 

Blake looks at Schofield for confirmation, for leadership, but rather than interrupt, Blake listens.

“... _Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us_ …”

Schofield is praying, something Blake has never really heard him do. He’s never taken Schofield for a holy man, but he assumes that anyone would need to find a trust in someone higher than himself after something like this. 

Near silence hangs over them, only Schofield's muttered prayers. Blake looks towards the door, focusing his hearing on what's above them, and doesn't pay it any mind when Schofield looks at him and then looks to the floor. Schofield lets out a shaky breath, and pushes the door open.

Blake holds his breath.

" _Amen_."

**Author's Note:**

> micah i absolutely adored writing this with you i am kissing you


End file.
